How hated will we be?

[SecondH]

DH and I are looking at buying a second home by the coast. I would love to hear from other second home owners and people who live in areas where there are lots of second home owners. How hated by the locals would we be? Do neighbours ignore you etc?

I tend to look for self catering facilities that wouldn't have been "normal" housing. For example when we visit our DD we usually stay in the same place if they have room and it's the converted dairy on a farm.
I don't live in Cornwall but in another very popular holiday desitination. I don't "hate tourists". Tourism is very important economically speaking and we all like to go on holiday. But I have also seen how damaging uncontrolled development can be and living in a holiday area does influence my behaviour on my own holidays. An outbuilding conversion or purpose built cabin was never going to be a family home for locals and a lot of farmers are needing to diversify for economic reasons so I do tend to prefer something like that, or a hotel over, say a cottage in the middle of a terrace in a village.
Tourism is very much a two edged sword and every type is going to have some downsides, but there are significant benefits too. It amuses me somewhat that the loudest professionally offended voices in our local Facebook groups are often recent arrivals, particularly retirees. Longstanding local families or people like us who moved here a long time ago for work and have raised our families here are often more pragmatic. Possibly that's because we actually need to live normal lives and earn a living here and can see the positives as well as negatives whereas they came with an expectation of a certain idyllic retirement lifestyle and are finding those pesky tourists are getting in the way!

Correct. The Air BnB model is a scourge on society.

When it was renting out a spare room it was fantastic. Now it's a business model being exploited for things like raves, mass parties, pop up brothels and leaves everyone unhappy except the users.

Interestingly, MP Andrew George is proposing some new legislation on this.

BBC News - New powers to curb second homes to be proposed
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1lynz8ly49o

Mr George was our local MP when I was a teenager as well - always seemed a nice chap. He used to bring his kids into the coffee shop I worked in on a Saturday for hot chocolates and tea cakes 😂

He is definitely knowledgeable on this subject and has seen the changes in the county over the last 50 years.

Despite being altruistic and considerate many people would add good for you that the higher bid was not necessary to your own particular financial situation.

"It will never be an area most locals on relatively modest wages can afford - but it never was!"
Really ??? Of course it was, I have family members who have lived there throughout my childhood, they had modest incomes and could afford it. They couldn't afford to buy there now however.

I think you could say this about many areas around London and the South East. It's how the property market has evolved - winners and losers.

This is very true. My DD and SIL did not make the highest offer on their current house but the seller, who was the son of the late owner, knew his Mum would have preferred it to go to a local couple and he was obviously in the fortunate position whereby having a smaller inheritance didn't matter too much. They were of course very grateful and it is a genuinely very kind thing for someone to do. But when they move to somewhere bigger they are very unlikely to be able to do the same thing for their buyer even though they'd like to. Unless they win the lottery or are lucky enough to find another seller willing to take a lower offer from a local they'll need every penny they can get to make the jump to their next home. It's easy to say that people shouldn't sell to second home owners but not everyone has the luxury of beung able to afford to turn down a higher offer.

Will you actually live there and be involved in the community?

Why do you care so much what people think of you? Are you normally worried about your neighbours liking you? Genuine question.

I shouldn't think anyone will care.

Yes - on top of charging 200% council tax, second home owners are already prohibited in St Ives from purchasing most new builds, so Andrew's plans just take this a step further. Jolly good.

Properties are slowly being made available by 2nd home owners selling up here. I'm looking to move in the £500K-£650k bracket and there has been a shift.

I hope whomever eventually buys that house keeps that lovely, classy looking cafe table and 4 seat combo… what a style choice that is!! 🙈😂😂

Someone said it's being rented by local staff who work in the service industry.

We sold a four bedroom house in a small village in two acres of land. Ideal for keeping hens, ducks in.

We sold to a local family who turned the house into an 11 bedAirbnb. Outside hot tub. They then built a two storey garage in the field. Turned that into a six bed with outdoor hot tub. So room for 17 party goers. 🙈

Mawgan Porth? Aren't you just paying celebrity neighbours tax? They're not very popular either, but they can afford not to care.

Coming home must be like a busman’s holiday 🙈 aw I hope no one does buy it then and they can continue to rent it as I can imagine finding long term, affordable rental properties there is a nightmare.

I didn't say they've sold up, they still own the property.

So, if they still own the property - and if they chose to sell for the market value, they could afford to buy it 🙃

I am a doctor I would have loved to move to Cornwall there are (were) plenty of jobs down there. But I am a Londoner with a RP accent, I worried my DC would never be accepted. We moved to Kent instead where there are plenty of displaced Londoners.

Eh? There are plenty of Londoners and Cornish people alike with RP and other accents in Cornwall..

It's not Doc Martin moi luvverr

I was quite stunned to read this. A lot of us are bi-dialectal - it isn't like Poldark. I know wider family in Kent who sound very Cockney to me - which is great but they have accents too ....

Sorry, could you say that in plain English?
Are you saying that because of the cost of housing, poorer people would resent a rich newcomer buying a second home?
The OP is asking about local reaction, and in my experience, richer people don't buy in poorer areas.
In any case, the question seems silly because I imagine each case would be different. I could imagine questions about finance, or questions about use, but to try to generalize about unknown people in an unknown area seems absurd.

I can't say for sure but I think the other poster is saying you're setting yourself a low bar if you are happy for locals to dislike you and it would only cause a problem if it reaches the extreme level of hatred. Basically implying you don't care much and are probably going to do it in any case.

Just my idea how I would interpret the comment..

Well, this one turned into a proper dumpster fire, didn’t it?!!

I think the problem would be living next door to different holidayers every week, not knowing how loud and inconsiderate they will be.

Well maybe it was 20 odd years ago, domething I considered and decided against.